FUEN delegation in the EP: we need majority communities to hear the message of minorities

14.09.2018 - Press releases

"There are still many European citizen’s who don’t know about the Minority SafePack Initiative. We will work towards spreading the message of the MSPI and we will ask majority communities for their support. We need to talk about our goal in the capitals of EU Member States so that we can secure the political support our initiative needs", said Loránt Vincze on Thursday in Strasbourg. At a meeting of the European Parliament’s Minority Intergroup he gave an update on the current state and strategic planning regarding the Citizen’s Initiative. Members of the FUEN delegation lead by President Vincze were Vice President of the organisation, Daniel Alfreider and Jens A. Christiansen, speaker of the European Dialogue Forum. The meeting was chaired by MEP György Schöpflin, Rapporteur on the European Citizen’s Initiatives in the EP.

The FUEN President stated: "It is encouraging that there is always a new development to speak of at the Intergroup meetings regarding the MSPI." He added that although 1 218 385 statements of support were signed and the threshold was reached in 11 states, there is still work to be done as the ultimate goal of this initiative is to create an EU level legislative framework for minority protection. In the upcoming weeks the Citizen’s Committee of the MSPI and the FUEN will address a letter to the European Commission asking if the institution means to address the issue of the initiative. If the answer is not an encouraging one the Citizen’s Committee will wait for the new EC to be formed before they hand in the statements of support.

In the opinion of FUEN Vice-President Daniel Alfreider, representing the Ladin community in South-Tyrol, the Minority SafePack Initiative was a great occasion for minorities in Europe to show each other, and the world that they have a presence on the continent: „Minorities need protection and are accustomed to building walls around themselves. With the MSPI however we have broken down these walls in order to find other minority communities across the continent with which we have similar goals and share values”, said the EPP politician from South-Tyrol. According to him, the challenge in the upcoming period will be to convince majority communities to support us and join our cause. They have already started negotiations with the new Italian government in order to pursue this, the South-Tyrolean pointed out. He asked the MEPs to join the lobby for the MSPI in their own states.

According to Jens A. Christiansen we need to see that if we want to save Europe, minority politics have to be a part of this process. Minority protection does not divide the EU but will unite it by guaranteeing equal rights for every EU citizen. Furthermore, he stated that minority rights are currently an issue of importance in Eastern and Central Europe but Western Europe will have to become more active in minority protection as it is a common goal of all Europeans.